Obsidian accused of transmisogyny in Pillars of Eternity

[endtherapture]

Backers of a certain tier in crowfunded success Pillars of Eternity got a memorial in game, in the form of a little poem/text piece in the game.

However this has pissed some people off and they want certain ones removed because of transmisogyny apparently.

The poem reads: "Here lies Firedorn, a hero in bed,
He once was alive, but now he's dead,
The last woman he bedded, turned out a man,
And crying in shame, off a cliff he ran"

Personally I think it will be another failure for gaming if this is removed from the game due to someone being a bit butt hurt. A fictional person in the Pillars world being transphobic, does not make the dev transphobic (at a stretch), and does not promote transmisognyny or anything like that, it's just a bit of background fluff in a huge RPG. It's like people are looking for stuff to be pissed off about now.

 

[Lufia Erim]

Wait that's what transphobic mean? So if i have sex with a woman, who use to be a man, and im not okay with that i'm transphobic? Well then i guess i'm a terrible person.

 

[Maximum Bert]

lol what, its a lighthearted poem geeez looks like we have gone back in toleration instead of forward.

But hey at least we have moved on from moaning about violence in games at least. I see no harm in this poem if people dont like it they can do what I dont when I dislike a game over something intensely and thats not buy it or not buy anything from that company in the future until your doubts are alleviated. I dont think I have ever been upset about what a game has said though even if I disagree with it.

Also I dont think Transmisogny is a recognised scrabble word its just a mashing together of two other words and that upsets me so much I think im going to burst into angry tears and start a petition. You cant just disregard the english language like that words have set meanings and if you just start mashing em together higildy piggildy you are destroying the very culture and traditions upon which we stand.

 

[Fat Hippo]

You cant just disregard the english language like that words have set meanings and if you just start mashing em together higildy piggildy you are destroying the very culture and traditions upon which we stand.

Damn straight! It's only german-speakers who get to slap words together however they like, don't take it away from us.

Also, the funniest things about this to me is that someone is actually reading the entries on those gravestones (there's bajillions of them), and then giving enough of a shit about it to complain on the internet. And I though I was good at wasting at my time.

 

[lacktheknack]

Geez. Imagine what would happen if people took the things I get offended by seriously.

 

[Adam Jensen_v1legacy]

Oh, are people's feelings hurt? Fuck 'em!

 

[Pseudonym]

The name of the thread is misleading. Obsidian were not accused of transmysoginy (I'm pretty sure transphobia is the word we are looking for) but of not preventing it. Not the same thing. Also, a tweet somebody sent is not a big deal, I think. I don't know who this is, but one person being upset by a poem in a game doesn't strike me as something relevant to gaming in general.

About the complaint. The joke assumes to be speaking of a heterosexual cisgendered male, yes. I didn't think it was about transgenders though but rather about a person really drunk who thought he was with a woman but turned out to be with a man. That might make it homophobic but even that isn't explicit. The charactar described was ashamed but it isn't stated clearly of what. It's crude and the author could probably have expected somebody somewhere to respond like this, but to interpret it as transphobic is to interpret beyond what is literally said.

 

[endtherapture]

The name of the thread is misleading. Obsidian were not accused of transmysoginy (I'm pretty sure transphobia is the word we are looking for) but of not preventing it. Not the same thing. Also, a tweet somebody sent is not a big deal, I think. I don't know who this is, but one person being upset by a poem in a game doesn't strike me as something relevant to gaming in general.

About the complaint. The joke assumes to be speaking of a heterosexual cisgendered male, yes. I didn't think it was about transgenders though but rather about a person really drunk who thought he was with a woman but turned out to be with a man. That might make it homophobic but even that isn't explicit. The charactar described was ashamed but it isn't stated clearly of what. It's crude and the author could probably have expected somebody somewhere to respond like this, but to interpret it as transphobic is to interpret beyond what is literally said.

Josh Sawyer, game designer at Obsidian, said the producers of the game are looking into the content. So this random Twitter persons opinion is actually being taken seriously, which is a shame.

 

[Albino Boo]

You cant just disregard the english language like that words have set meanings and if you just start mashing em together higildy piggildy you are destroying the very culture and traditions upon which we stand.

Damn straight! It's only german-speakers who get to slap words together however they like, don't take it away from us.

Also, the funniest things about this to me is that someone is actually reading the entries on those gravestones (there's bajillions of them), and then giving enough of a shit about it to complain on the internet. And I though I was good at wasting at my time.

The Swedes do it as well. Apparently Spårvagnsaktiebolagsskensmutsskjutarefackföreningspersonalbeklädnadsmagasinsförrådsförvaltarens is a word.

 

[Vendor-Lazarus]

Was I the only one who immediately thought of this image?
<spoiler=ever so slightly risque..not NSFW though>https://i.imgur.com/Vo6vy.jpg>

On topic..The outrage machine continues on..oblivious.

 

[The Artificially Prolonged]

I tell you what the first person who can harness the power of Internet drama and turn it into a energy source will be a rich man/woman/whatever else you'd call yourself indeed.

Now if only my computer hadn't decided to mess up this weekend I could be playing Pillars of Eternity instead having to reinstall everything and follow this drama. Granted I don't have to follow it but I guess curiosity has a nasty habit of winning out against better judgment, especially when sitting at a desk watching progress bars slowly fill up is probably just as damaging to my sanity.

 

[Someone Depressing]

That's actually pretty funny, and clearly a simple joke. The only people to make a fuss out of this are SJW-types.

 

[Saetha]

Looking at this thread, I think we're reaching a certain critical mass of complaining.

Like, yeah there were people before who were like "Oh jeez, someone's whining again, whatever!" but a lot of the responses I've been seeing to these moral outrages lately have ranged from utter apathy to... slightly more approving apathy.

You know how real progress could be made? If the people who are upset about this stuff don't just vomit their opinions on Twitter whenever they feel like it. That just makes others tune them out, like how you tune out global warming activists or healthy lifestyle advocates. You know that they're talking about a serious problem, but chances are good that you've already done whatever you're going to do to change it. But if these people all got together, formed some sort of activist group, and pursued their cause with focused, single-minded determination, and maximized their efforts to change things, maybe they'd see more results.

In other words - leave the bitching to the professionals, please.

 

[ZiggyE]

Two things:

1. Seems to me the poem is more at the expense of the guy who killed himself rather than any transwomen.
2. Even if it were something transphobic, inclusion of specific material is not akin to endorsing it, and assuming this to be the case sets up a dangerous precedent where a creator's artistic vision can be severely hampered because of the content shown. Only videogames seem to have this problem for some reason, no one ever goes after films and books.

 

[Seishisha]

In other news, people in yellow t-shirts offends my sensiblities if i see anyone wearing such attire i will sue them for all they own except the offending shirt ofcourse, that needs to be burned.

Seriously though what i wrote there is no less rediculous than claiming that obsidian are somehow allowinng transphobic content and attitudes in their game. That poem in no way enables or supports transphobia or "transmisogyny" which i asume based on the wording is hatred of transgendered women/men that identify as such etc...

If you break down the rhyme

"Here lies Firedorn, a hero in bed," so basicly dude was a good lay, nothing wrong so far.

"He once was alive, but now he's dead," need i realy explain this line.

"The last woman he bedded, turned out a man," cross-dresser or actual transgendered individual it is not clear.

"And crying in shame, off a cliff he ran" commited suicide because of his own actions, if hatred was his real aim then surley he would have killed his partner instead.

Overly simplistic my breakdown may be, but i see no hatred of transgendered people, no message that they are somehow aweful and deserving of such hatred and no call for other people to hate them.

Some people just can't get by without marking others with some kind of branding iron and saying look at these arseholes what they did upsets me, news flash random twitter user just because you don't like somthing doesnt mean it is wrong, just because you feel offense to somthing doesnt me it should be removed.

Let me clear now this is an example, it does not reflect my own opinions and should be treated as such.
Had the poem been somthing more like this.

"i hate tranny's i want to cut them up,
lets all grab a knife and fuck them all up"

Then you would have cause for complaint and rightly so because that example is the kind of horrible bullshit that people actualy do have spewed at them just for being alive.

-End rant, wow i feel kinda dirty and better at the same time for that.

 

[Captain Marvelous_v1legacy]

Well, this is... a thing. I think the future of comedy is bleak. No more Race, Gender, or Sex jokes because those are going to be something-phobic. And those are my favorites! D: I don't want a future where people can't laugh at themselves or cry when they are the butt of the joke. The poem is funny and people are becoming a little too thin skinned. I can already see how this is going to end. The poem shall be removed. How disappointing.

 

[DementedSheep]

And the other day I saw someone claim they had to make a male character because it was possible to have THREE WOMEN (OMG!) in the opening scene of DA:I doing shit without a man present and that this is pushing feminist agenda as well as claims that bioware are attempting to turn men gay by having a character like Cassandra. Oh and a pretty common one is about how the lack of someone like Isabella in this one game is unfair.

In other words, people always complain about something. This at least I can see why it would annoy someone as it using the tired old trans (or gay men, it's not clear) are gross and you should be ashamed if you are ever attracted to one thing though I don't agree with the complaint. The guy is the butt of the joke. It's unlikely that him killing himself over it is suppose to be reasonable. Transmisogyny? is that a thing or are they just mashing terms.

 

[cthulhuspawn82]

With all the effort we put into not offending people, couldn't we divert a little of that effort into finding out why people get offended by stuff like this? Is it something in their brain, or something they learn. Finding out what their problem is, and fixing in might be more efficient then over-scrutinizing each piece of media.